Saturday, March 30, 2013

Cardinal Mooney heads into the football season looking for its first playoff berth season since 2008. Percentages are in the Cougars' favor - they are in a three-team Class 3A-District 6 and two teams reach the playoffs.
Here is the Cougars' schedule.
Game time is 7 p.m. unless otherwise noted.

Friday, March 29, 2013

The spring postseason gets underway this week in the form of district tennis tournaments.
Listed below are the tournaments involving area schools. District champions and runners-up advance to the regional team tournament, scheduled for Tuesday, April 9 and Thursday, April 11.
The No. 1 singles and doubles district champions advance to the individual state tournament, which begins the week of Monday, April 15 at various sites.

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Prior to covering Wednesday's conference call regarding the Florida High School Athletic Association's responses to new legislation that could alter how the association handles cases involving ineligible athletes, I emailed questions to Rep. Larry Metz, R-Yalaha.
Rep. Metz got back to me last night, and here are his answers:

What is your impetus behind the bills, which call for shorter investigations and put the burden of proof on the FHSAA to prove clear evidence of wrongdoing?Rep. Metz: I became aware of the issues surrounding the FHSAA's heavy-handed policies during the debate on legislation last year. I respect Sen. (Kelli) Stargel, a former House colleague, and I am working with her on another education bill affecting public schools. When I heard that problems impacting student athletes still persists because the FHSAA has not embraced the changes we made last year, I decided to sponsor this legislation. The bill provides needed reforms intended to produce a more properly balanced system of checks and balances to govern investigations and ruling, as well as driving organizational culture change. The current FHSAA is too quick to assume that actions by student-athletes are in futherance of cross-school recruiting. However, students can in fact leave their current schools for perfectly legitimate reasons, including fleeing from abusive coaches, parental divorce or residential change, or because they are seeking a better academic opportunity, i.e., exercising school choice. The mere fact that they are also athletes should not subject them to onerous investigations as presumed cheaters, and the bill's presumption of eligibility provision will help reverse this trend. More importantly, student-athletes deserve true due process and should not be subjected to long, grueling investigations initiated with little or no supporting evidence. High school students have a limited window of eligibility and cannot get time back lost to an overzealous investigation. The intent of this legislation is not to allow students and families to consider athletics when picking a school. The intent of this legislation is to establish due process when it comes to FHSAA proceedings and investigations, which the FHSAA clearly lacks.

What is your response to the FHSAA's claim that this bill will undermine the integrity of prep sports and turn student-athletes into free agents who can simply jump from one school to another?Rep Metz: The scenario described by the FHSAA is a highly unlikely one which House Bill 1279 does not allow. Both common sense and systemic checks and balances would prevent this type of extreme scenario from happening. To begin with, in order to be eligible to play any sport, the student must be registered at each school before the particular seasons starts for that sport. In the hypothetical, a student would have to have started football at one school and then successfully execute two full and complete moves just at the right time during the school year in order to register at the destination school and maintain eligibility. Further, in order to transfer schools without a full and complete move, the student would have to obtain the school board's approval each and every time. Any school board applying common sense to those facts would realize that the same student is attempting to conduct multiple transfers in one academic year and they would likely deny the transfer requests and prevent this from happening.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Lakewood Ranch takes a 2-0 record into the final day of Red Bracket pool play today at the Sarasota Baseball Classic.
The Mustangs play Eagle's View Academy at 7:30 p.m. tonight at the Buck O'Neil Baseball Complex. Whomever wins will be the champion out of Pool B and will face the winner of Pool A - either Charlotte or Boca Raton - for the Red Bracket championship Thursday.
Listed below is today's schedule of games featuring area teams:

Monday, March 25, 2013

Baseball teams from four states as well as the District of Columbia will compete in the inaugural IMG National Classic.
The event runs Monday, April 1 and concludes Friday, April 5, with the championship game scheduled for 1 p.m.
Here is the schedule for the first day of the tournament. For more information, head to the tournament's official website.

Manatee has hired Troy Bellamy as its new boys basketball coach, athletic director Joe Kinnan announced Monday.
Bellamy replaces Randy Smith, who stepped down after three seasons.
A Sarasota graduate, Bellamy recently worked under Stefan Gates at Cardinal Mooney, and helped the Cougars reach the Class 3A-Region 3 championship game.
"Hopefully with a renewed emphasis on tough defense and fundamentals," Kinnan said, "Manatee's basketball team will return to a competitive level under Troy's leadership."

Friday, March 22, 2013

The Florida High School Athletic Association released tentative districts Friday for volleyball and basketball.
Schools have until April 5 to appeal their classifications.
Listed below are the districts involving area teams.

Bradenton Christian is in pursuit of the program's first playoff berth, and will be the only team on this side of the bridge competing in Class 2A-District 5.
Here is the Panthers' schedule, which originally ran on floridahsfootball.com.
Games begin at 7:30 p.m. unless otherwise noted.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Curt Bradley and the Braden River Pirates struggled to a 1-9 mark last season, a result of a tough schedule coupled with an avalanche of injuries.
Here is a look at who the Pirates face in the fall as they try to get back on track, courtesy of floridahsfootball.com.
All games begin at 7:30 p.m.

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

It's a new era at Bayshore, where Elijah Freeman has been hired as the program's new coach coach.
The Bruins are hoping for some new results, too. Bayshore hasn't reached the playoffs since 2005 and hasn't had a winning season since '03.
Will they put an end to either of those streaks in 2013?
Here is Bayshore's schedule, which was originally posted on floridahsfootball.com.
Game time is 7:30 p.m.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Bradenton Christian Nick Scheimann has been selected to play in the Florida Athletic Coaches Association's All-Star Boys Classic on Saturday.
The game will be played after the girls game, which tips off at 11 a.m., at Indian River State College in Fort Pierce.
Scheimann will suit up for the South team, which is coached by Fort Myers' Scott Guttery.
Scheimann averaged over 16 points, eight rebounds and four blocks a game for the Panthers, the Class 3A-District 10 runners-up.
He was the area's only player to be picked for the FACA All-Star Game.

Friday, March 1, 2013

Manatee's Cord Sandberg is ranked 27th on MaxPreps' list of the top 100 baseball seniors.
Sandberg is known for his play at quarterback, and has signed a letter of intent to play football at Mississippi State.
But he is projected to go high in this summer's amateur baseball draft and has said he would like to take a stab at professional baseball.

Chris Conboy will not return as Manatee's quarterbacks coach. With new head coach John Booth coaching the quarterbacks and John's...

About this blog

Prep Rally is all about high school sports in Manatee County. From baseball to basketball, softball to soccer, volleyball to track, swimming to wrestling and weightlifting, if they play it, you can read about it at Prep Rally.

The author, John Lembo, has covered prep sports for the Bradenton Herald since 2005.